At 10 a.m. on 27 October the Supreme Court of Belarus will start consideration of the suit of the Ministry of Justice for liquidation of the Republican charity public association “Helpful Hand”.

RCPA “Helpful Hand” is one of the best known charity NGOs of the country. It gives humanitarian aid to Belarusian prisoners, socially rehabilitates them after prison and psychologically adapts them to free life. RCPA “Helpful Hand” not only enjoys authority among prisoners, but is also respected by workers of the penitentiary system.

The reason for liquidation of the organization is that the Ministry of Justice didn’t receive any answer to its letter with the demand to present information about the organization activity, sent in July 2003. The Ministry of Justice took the opinion that absence of answer witnessed that the organization office wasn’t functioning in the place of its juridical address.

Ulasta Aliaksiuk, the organization Head, says that the organization didn’t receive the letter, which can be a result of bad functioning of the post or the recent moving to a new juridical address.

Yury Chavusaw, coordinator of the system defense net of NGOs of Belarus, says that this case characterizes the present situation in the public life of Belarus: a well-known public association can be liquidated because of trifle mistakes or slow work of the post. So, the number of liquidated Belarusian NGOs soon can soon become 20.